97 Corolla Starting Troubles

[illQuille]

Hey, new poster here. I bought a 97 Corolla last month and everything was fine until 5 days ago. I never had problems with it starting at all. On Tuesday I went to work in the morning, after a eight hour shift I go to my car to go home. I go to start the car and nothing comes on, no lights or anything. Afte awhile of messing around I finally got the lights to come back on but the car still won't start. It won't even attempt to turnover. No noises at all. But after speaking with the previous owner today he believes it the anti-theft system kicking in. He says it has happened to him before. I hadn't been using my remote entry so he told me to try it and it worked to a degree. I locked the doors with the remote and unlocked it with the key. When I went to start the car this time it made it a clicking noise but not a trying to turnover clicking. I tried different combinations of remote entry and key entry but I can't get past this stage. And some of the combinations made the problem revert back to the previous stage. Any idea what is going on?

[kickfli12]

first off, do you recall leaving something on? do you know if the battery is any good? my old integra did the same thing but if i left it sitting for a while it would actually try to start and if it were warm out it would crank up no problem. the battery may not have the cranking amps to actually start it. if the battery is good, find out if the starter is engaging. i pulled my girlfriends honda into the shop last year to do a transmission flush and went to crank it up and nothing happened. the starter went in the blink of an eye.

[illQuille]

I forgot to mention but I had a new battery put in last month and I dont recall leaving anything on.

[kickfli12]

can it be jump started?

[ganda1f]

Turn the key to start, nothing but a single click? Most likely worn copper contacts in the switchbox on the starter.